April 18, 2017
What America Can Learn from China’s People’s Liberation Army
President Trump recently called for a $54 billion increase in military spending to “send a message to the world… of American strength, security, and resolve.” The U.S. defense establishment is currently grappling with how these additional funds should be spent to achieve the stated objective. Merely investing in increasing the size of our forces is ineffective. Instead, the United States must prioritize modernizing its capabilities to meet new types of threats. As the United States advances down this path, it could look towards an unlikely source for inspiration: the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). China watchers around the world continue to characterize the PLA as a “paper tiger”, but the United States could stand to learn a thing or two about force modernization from its Asian counterpart.
China’s last major conflict with a foreign adversary, its failed offensive in the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese war, led foreign commentators and military experts to deem the PLA a “ragtag” military that was disorganized and underfunded. Generally, the PLA lacked the technology and organizational wherewithal needed to fight even the smallest of adversaries. Today, the PLA has undergone massive military modernization efforts. They still note that the PLA is “not ready” to fight in a modern war due to technological gaps in China’s air defense, the nature of the bureaucratic and corrupt Chinese state, and its lack of combat experience.
Read the full article at The National Interest.
More from CNAS
-
Saudi Arabia Halts Energy Sites as Houthis Claim New Attacks
Video
Becca Wasser, adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, joins Bloomberg to discuss the latest on the Iran War, control over the Strait of Hormuz, and th...
By Becca Wasser
-
Where Do We Go from Here?
Commentary
Introduction Over the past nine months, The New American Defense Industrial Base essay series has brought together a wide range of participants to deliver a variety of views o...
By Susanna V. Blume
-
Commentary
Indo-Pacific Security / Technology & National Security
Sharper: China's AI RiseArtificial intelligence has become a strategic priority for Beijing and Washington, yet both countries continue to pursue dramatically different strategies in their bid for gl...
By Charles Horn & Cadence Barker
-
Indo-Pacific Stability Depends on Eastern Africa’s Prosperity
Commentary
The Strait of Malacca, Taiwan, and the South China Sea dominate the Asian debate. However, chokepoints further from home could prove similarly devastating....
By Derek Grossman
